


Casualty of War

by ArtemisRae



Series: Alphabet Challenge [38]
Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-06-29
Updated: 2010-06-29
Packaged: 2017-10-21 15:12:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/226593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArtemisRae/pseuds/ArtemisRae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>No matter how well they read each other, there are always new discoveries.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Casualty of War

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a second round of Alphabet Challenge at my LJ, where I was given a prompt for every letter of the alphabet. My prompt for this fic was "army"

* * *

  
_army_  
-noun  
1\. a large body of persons trained and armed for war.  


* * *

“Annabeth, shield!” She barely got her shield up in time at Percy’s shout, nearly dropping it as the metal heated underneath her hands. Somewhere there was a call of “release!” and a hail of arrows arrived from the Apollo cabin behind the ranks of sword fighters.

The automaton – a dragon, spewing flames as it lumbered across the field – roared in annoyance and ducked back towards Percy and Annabeth, heavily favoring its left side. When it seemed safe to drop her shield, she saw that – exactly as planned – the two of them had caught the dragon’s attention once again.

There was the mechanical noise of air flowing through the dragon’s valves, and then another flare; Annabeth rolled out of the way just in time, narrowly avoiding skewering herself on her own dagger, and climbed back onto her feet just in time to realize that Percy had taken the blast square in the face.

Knowing it was pointless, she didn’t bother to ask if he was all right as she side-stepped around him and thrust her dagger into its neck, yanking it back with short, jagged movements that she hoped would snap the right wire somewhere. In her peripheral vision, she could see Percy driving forward with Riptide, keeping the automaton’s focus even as it screeched and tried to throw her.

It stiffened suddenly, and pitched towards her; Percy grabbed her by the scruff of her armor at the last minute and dragged her away as the dragon took one more step and fell, landing heavily on its left side. Malcolm was grinning at her from across its flank, flush with victory.

She turned to smile at Percy who was still frowning as he gently felt his forehead with the tips of his fingers. Concerned, Annabeth reached and helped him pull off his partially melted helmet, slapping his hands away while she looked.

“Huh,” she finally said, trying to keep her face serious. “So your eyebrows aren’t invulnerable.”


End file.
